The stage was set when students heard the news at 7:18 p.m. that SUBOG had cancelled the spring concert. Lil Uzi Vert stated via Twitter that his flight had been cancelled. (Amar Batra/The Daily Campus)

Shortly after students had already begun lining up with excitement and anticipation of the rapper Lil Uzi Vert’s performance, SUBOG announced at 7:18 p.m. that the concert was cancelled. SUBOG cited “unforeseen circumstances beyond UConn’s control” and Lil Uzi Vert took to Twitter to explain soon after that his flight had been cancelled: “@UConn I Love You. Today was suppose to be special . I went to a lot of lame schools and my flight was fine .Now they wanna delay sh**”.

Handling the situation in the immediate aftermath, SUBOG did the best they could. However, there are still many questions. Why, in the first place, was Lil Uzi Vert scheduled to fly into Connecticut so close to the time he was scheduled to perform? Additionally, why was opening act Amine still not able to perform either? Perhaps, going forward SUBOG should have a contingency plan in case similar occurrences happen, such as a backup DJ and partial refund policy that students can be told about and aware of ahead of time.

Many students had been looking forward to the night, and there are only two other major concerts during the year (the Fall and Winter One) with the Spring Concert being the biggest one. Fortunately, the WHUS’s Spring Fling concert with more alternative and Indie music was going Saturday, which many students were able to go to instead.

SUBOG announced that students would receive spring concert refunds in the form of prepaid debit cards. Students complete an online form, then must bring their physical printed tickets to the Student Activities Programs office to sign another form and turn in the tickets. Then, student expect to receive a prepaid debit card, credited the amount of the ticket’s face value, in the mail. Of course, this is one of SUBOG’s few options for refund disbursements, and it is important that SUBOG is able to offer complete refunds; yet this process is both timely, and hurts students who paid above face value for tickets, such as on Buy or Sell, or non-students who bought them off others. Going forward, SUBOG should further develop contingency planning, and planning ahead of time to prevent this in the future.